Swing Counties Tell Story of Republicans’ Defeat

Dec. 3 (Bloomberg) -- When it comes to Pennsylvania’s
presidential politics, Republicans are like the cartoon
character Charlie Brown, who every time he prepares to kick a
football, it gets pulled back by his pal Lucy.

This time, it was Mitt Romney who was tempted to go for the
prize, as his camp poured $10 million into Pennsylvania in the
closing weeks of the campaign. He lost by more than five points,
suffering the same fate as every one of his party’s nominees in
the previous five elections.

To understand why, look at two Philadelphia suburban
counties: Delaware, a middle-class enclave, and Montgomery, a
more affluent home along the blue-blood Main Line. Republicans
win many of the local offices in Montgomery and Delaware, and
until a few decades ago, so did the party’s presidential
nominees. This November, President Barack Obama carried both
counties by about 60,000 votes.

Montgomery is Pennsylvania’s third-most-populated county
and Delaware its fifth, both are growing and becoming more
diverse. The residents aren’t Romney’s 47 percent -- those he
called takers who rely on government largesse -- they just don’t
like the current brand of national Republicanism.

Staying Blue

Pennsylvania will remain relatively blue in presidential
politics until Republicans can compete in these counties.

This state of affairs is replicated in venues that really
were swing states, Virginia and Colorado for starters.

In Virginia, Prince William and Loudon counties are
Washington exurbs that Obama carried in 2008, but had gone for
George W. Bush in 2004, and were won decisively by the
Republican Governor Bob McDonnell three years ago. Four days
before the election, McDonnell predicted that Romney would win
the counties this year.

Instead, Obama carried Prince William, the third-most-populous county in the state, by 16 percent, or 28,873 votes. He
won a narrower, but clear, victory in Loudoun, which before 2008
hadn’t voted for a Democratic president since 1964 and where 20
years earlier George H.W. Bush won more than two to one.

These two counties, although different, share important
political characteristics. They are fast-growing -- Prince
William’s population has quadrupled over the past 40 years and
Loudoun’s has grown 10-fold -- affluent and diversifying with a
mix of Latinos, blacks and Asians. In local races, they favor
Republicans; the national patterns are going the other way.

The picture is similar in Colorado, particularly in Arapahoe
County, to the east of Denver, the state’s third-most populous,
and to the west, Jefferson County, which casts more votes than
any other. Like their Virginia counterparts, these counties are
fast-growing and comparatively well off. They shape close
elections.

Arapahoe is more diverse, with more minorities, and tilts
more Democratic. Obama carried it Nov. 6 by 10 points, more than
a tilt.

Jefferson is typical of large, growing suburbs with a range
of voters from upper income to working class. “It mirrors in
every election, Colorado,” says Craig Hughes, a top Democratic
consultant there. “If you want to carry the state, you carry
Jefferson.” Obama won it by almost five points.

It’s also instructive, in a slightly different way, to look
at a few big counties in Florida and Ohio, the mothers of all
battleground states.

Florida Bellwether

In Florida, it’s Hillsborough County, consisting of Tampa
and environs. It’s the fourth-most-populous county in the state
and the best bellwether: It has voted the same as the rest of
the state in every presidential contest since Jack Kennedy won
in 1960.

Before 2008, Hillsborough had gone Republican in six of the
seven preceding presidential elections. It went for Obama by
about seven points last time and by a similar margin this year.

“The Democrats’ grass-roots organization bringing
minorities and young college students to vote was the
difference,” says Susan MacManus, a political science professor
at the University of South Florida.

In Ohio, it was Hamilton County, which includes Cincinnati
and suburbs. Ohio is a diverse state, and the political race
touched all corners; Hamilton County is a microcosm of that
diversity: old-line Republicans, who used to dominate, plus
young professionals and racial minorities. It was carried by
George W. Bush in 2004 and Obama in 2008 and 2012.

There was no place where the ground game or infrastructure
battle was joined more forcefully, on both sides. Obama almost
matched his 2008 margin, carrying the county by about 20,000
votes. In such a pitched battle, there are lots of explanations.

Alex Triantafilou, the energetic Republican chairman for
Hamilton County, worries that among the “independent swing
voter, the 35- to 45-year-old female whose dad was a
Republican” and among young professionals, “we just didn’t do
as well as we should have.”

In 2012, Obama was a stronger candidate with a superior
organization. Republicans are in dangerous disfavor with
minorities and young voters. The party’s problems run deeper, as
these eight bellwether counties across the U.S. illustrate.

(Albert R. Hunt is a Bloomberg View columnist. The opinions
expressed are his own.)